Three DSA Congress Members Vote to Ban the Railway Strike

Statement by Reform & Revolution

DSA Needs a Fundamental Change in its Electoral Strategy

The vote by three DSA members in Congress against the basic rights of working class people to withhold our labor and go on strike is unacceptable. We need discussions in the run-up to and decisions at the 2023 DSA National Convention to hold elected officials in Congress and in state and local office accountable. To make this a reality, we also need a debate on how to apply accountability in our own organization, DSA.

A central challenge throughout the history of the socialist movement has been keeping our elected leaders accountable as they face relentless ruling class pressure in an environment built to manage capitalism, not represent workers. The latest example of this is the vote of DSA members Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC), Cori Bush, and Jamaal Bowman on November 30 in favor of the Democratic Party’s leadership attempt to ban a looming railroad strike – planned to start on December 9th –and to impose a tentative agreement that a majority of the members of the railroad unions have rejected. 

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The Background 

A railroad strike would have a huge impact. The Wall Street Journal reported that “estimates have put the ultimate costs in the billions of dollars, based in part on prolonged shortages resulting from a lack of alternative delivery channels for key items” (December 3, 2022).

The workers planned to use this huge economic power as leverage to demand paid sick days. The railroads made over $21 billion this year in the first three quarters – 65 times more than the cost of providing seven paid sick days (data from Bernie Sanders, December 2).

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The Counter-arguments

The defense by AOC and others thus far has been to say that unions asked them to vote in favor of the bill to ban the strike as part of a compromise with Nancy Pelosi (at that time still the House Speaker) to allow a vote on a seven day sick leave package. 

First of all, the majority of members of these unions voted on the tentative agreement and a majority of the membership did not approve it. They were preparing strike action. The way to get seven (or the 15 days unions had demanded) days of paid sick leave was to force the railroad bosses – if necessary by a strike. 

Socialists in office should not outsource their policies to union leaders, many of whom are often quite conservative and believe in class collaboration. While getting the input of union leaders is important, at the end of the day socialists in office need to make their own political judgments. 

Let us remember the vast majority of union leaders supported Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden against Bernie Sanders in the 2016 and 2020 primaries, and DSA did not follow their advice in those situations. Too often unions have unfortunately supported environmentally destructive programs because of promises of jobs – something socialists in office need to disagree with (while expressing sympathy). In the case of the bill to impose an agreement on the railroad workers, DSA Congressmember Rashida Tlaib made the correct decision to vote against imposing it. 

Second, the whole maneuver was rotten from the start. The seven days of sick leave was not included in the first bill in order to allow the Senate to pass the first bill (banning the strike) without the seven day sick leave provision. AOC and others claim that this would have still increased the pressure and the incentives for president Biden to step in with an executive order that would include the seven days of sick leave. But Biden had asked the Democrats in Congress in a letter from the White House “to pass legislation immediately to adopt the Tentative Agreement between railroad workers and operators – without any modifications or delay – to avert a potentially crippling national rail shutdown.” 

If there had been an outspoken socialist left standing against Democrats and Republicans to ban a strike, this would have made a real difference in the struggle against such maneuvers. If the entire left had voted like Rashida Tlaib – “no” on the ban of the strike, “yes” on the 7 days sick leave – it would have been an even stronger signal on the one hand to Biden (to act in favor of the workers) and on the other hand to the workers (that socialists are on their side, never voting to take away their right to collective workplace action). 

Debate About Accountability

On December 1, Seattle DSA published a call for action by the NPC, later on supported by 21 other chapters, 5 YDSA chapters, the AfroSoc caucus nationally as well as two political caucuses, Reform & Revolution and Marxist Unity Group (tinyurl.com/SDSA-RailroadStrike): 

“We call on the DSA National Political Committee (NPC) to organize a town hall to make clear that DSA stands 100 percent with railroad workers and against the government’s ban of their strike. […] The town hall discussion will also help to determine how to proceed regarding the vote of the three DSA Congressmembers, including potential disciplinary action. It should mark the beginning of a structured discussion within DSA, concluding at our 2023 National Convention, on what we expect from DSA members elected to public office and how to hold them accountable to DSA’s platform. As part of this, DSA nationally should establish a Socialists in Office committee which holds regular meetings with the NPC and is able to make binding decisions on legislative matters.”

DSA’s national leadership, the NPC, issued a statement on December 4, saying: 

“We are proud of DSA member Rep. Rashida Tlaib’s vote against the TA, and for sick days. Any vote by Congress to impose a bad contract on workers sides with the boss, and contradicts democratic socialist values.
We disagree and are disappointed with the decision of DSA members Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rep. Cori Bush to needlessly vote to enforce the TA.”

This statement also announces a step toward collective discussion within DSA through a “mass call”.

However, there is no mention of any process to develop DSA’s ability to hold elected officials accountable. The NPC should be clear about the subject of the “mass call” – it is needed to talk about the Railway Workers Strike and the DSA Congress members should be told to be there to hear what DSA representatives have to say. The subject of the meeting also needs to include how we can hold elected officials accountable. This is a topic the NPC has not just shied away from, but has – in the case of Jamaal Bowman’s votes for military aid to Israel – turned into its opposite by taking disciplinary measures not against Bowman, but DSA’s national BDS working group and its leadership who dared to criticize Bowman.  

Necessary Consequences

Some comrades in DSA are calling for the expulsion of the three Congress members who voted against the workers’ rights to strike. 

We believe that DSA would emerge from this crisis stronger if we made every possible attempt to convince and pressure the three DSA members of Congress to change their approach. We share the skepticism many comrades have that these members of Congress will change their approach, or even participate in a genuine dialogue with DSA’s membership on the issue. 

However, we do not believe the majority of DSA members have drawn those conclusions. The role of the Marxist left in DSA needs to be to find ways to win a majority of DSA’s membership to our ideas. We don’t want to act out of anger and thereby make it easier for the leadership of DSA to isolate us and allow them to continue the existing (broken) electoral strategy. 

Expelling DSA’s most prominent representatives may help preserve our political integrity, but expulsions alone will not increase our power to hold other elected leaders accountable in the future. Especially if the majority in DSA does not understand that step. 

DSA’s federally elected officials are its highest profile public representatives, and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is one of the most popular politicians in the United States. The decision to expel or even censure these officials would become national news and potentially draw criticism and condemnation from progressive journalists, organizers, and politicians. We need to prepare DSA for such an outcome – if we can’t avoid it. 

Expulsion may still be necessary if our elected representatives continue to betray workers and refuse to be accountable to our organization. But we need to deal with them firstly through educational measures, by an organized discussion in DSA, and by a collective, democratic process that we can uphold in the future, no matter what comes up. 

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Building Accountability   

Now is the time for DSA to take steps toward holding our representatives in public office and in our leadership accountable. Several proposals that did not pass at the 2021 DSA National Convention should be seen in a new light given the recent experiences. 

The discussion in the run-up to the August 2023 convention of our organization and the convention itself needs to grapple with these issues and adopt policies that ensure comrades in elected office promote DSA, advance socialist ideas, build movements – and act in line with DSA´s general program and political decisions. Proposals that should be taken up can be read below.

Our strategic aim in electoral work should be to run and elect candidates who will use their high profile positions to represent DSA’s politics, popularize DSA’s campaigns, encourage people to join DSA, and actively build grassroots movements from below. Unfortunately, the vast majority of DSA members in elected office do not currently play this role. DSA members elected who represent DSA should be required to:

A. When there are multiple DSA representatives in a body, a Socialist Caucus should be formed that projects its own public profile, policies, messaging, and votes together as a block. In Congress DSA representatives should be identified with a Socialist Caucus, rather than being subsumed in the Progressive Caucus as is currently the case. While we should collaborate with progressives on issues we agree on, socialist and progressive politics are fundamentally different. DSA representatives need to act as a voice for socialism and not be lost in a broader progressive milieu.

B. In our endorsement process we need to identify DSA candidates who commit to run for office to represent DSA and commit to the points below. DSA should prioritize mobilizing its resources – financial contributions from comrades as well as volunteers – for those DSA candidates who commit to these requirements to act as representatives of DSA. 

C. While we need to adopt these standards for candidates who will run to represent DSA, we should maintain the tactical flexibility of calling for votes for and supporting other left-wing candidates whose election would advance the interests of the Left but who are not running to represent DSA, but might still be DSA endorsed candidates. Bernie Sanders in his presidential campaigns was not running as a DSA representative, but it was correct in our view for DSA to actively campaign for Bernie, while maintaining full freedom to raise our own politics and criticisms.

D. DSA Candidates, running to represent DSA:

• 1. Comrades who want to be DSA candidates need to vote in accordance with DSA’s platform. DSA’s elected leadership (the NPC for Congress, chapter or state leaderships for lower office) should establish Socialists in Office Committee’s. These committee’s should discuss upcoming significant votes with elected officials and communicate those discussions to the  membership. DSA candidates need to commit to follow the voting recommendations of these committee’s.
• 2. DSA candidates should commit to participate in DSA sponsored town halls and other forms of discussion including on issues where controversies around their work arise; they have to commit that their public profile and position will be used to help publicize when DSA has criticisms of their votes or other actions. 

E. Other DSA endorsed candidates:

In order to make clear that running as a DSA-endorsed candidate means running to build working-class political power, we should come back to the amendment (tinyurl.com/Amend5toRes8) that got 43 percent of the votes at the last DSA National Convention in 2021 which stated (among other demands):

“[Be it]Resolved that, in order to build toward political and organizational independence, DSA encourages nationally-endorsed candidates to

1. Clearly identify, in public-facing campaign messaging, as democratic socialists who are running against the Democratic Party’s corporate establishment;

2. Use campaigns and elected offices to encourage supporters to join DSA, help organize unions, and build independent working-class political organizations;

3. Refuse support for corporate Democrats, actively support left-wing challenges to establishment incumbents, and help build fundraising and campaign networks for DSA candidates instead of contributing to Democratic legislative PACs (e.g. DCCC, DSCC, etc.);

4. Defend anti-corporate and left-wing independent electoral candidates from corporate and right-wing attacks;

5. If elected, work to build democratic socialist caucuses in legislative bodies, orient these caucuses towards conflict with the capitalist Democratic Party establishment, and prioritize the creation and expansion of socialist caucuses over reforming Democratic legislative caucuses;

6. Be active, dues-paying members of DSA and frequently consult their local chapters on political and legislative decisions.”

F. In order to hold elected comrades within DSA accountable, we should revive the efforts from the 2021 Convention to be able to recall NPC members and to democratically elect comrades to fill NPC vacancies (tinyurl.com/resolution5dsa21), to elect the National Director (tinyurl.com/resolution4dsa21), and set policy through national referendums (tinyurl.com/BylawChange2). 

(For a broader context of the resolutions from 2021, read our full report on the 2021 Convention here.)